Newest Member of the Family...

I would like to introduce you to the newest member of the Harris Family… Pinky Harris.

As part of Tess’s Christmas present she got a fish tank and picked out a beta fish. She also picked out a castle and pink rocks. Pinky has since got a slight tank upgrade because his other tank was leaking.

December 2015

One busy month into another. One thing I love about December is Christmas decorations and with our decorations is the snowball gun. We had multiple snowball fights throughout the month. I took pictures of one fight to show the aftermath and how many snowballs we have acquired over time. Tess loves to have these fights and I am pretty positive that Clayton loves these fights as well.

Tess had a Christmas party at Daycare and by the look on her face when we walked in I think she was pretty excited that both Clayton and I showed up to the party. She obviously had a lot of sugar during the party and she was bouncing off the walls. The room did a book exchange, so everyone had to sit in the circle and the teachers passed out the books and everyone opened up their books. Tess got a Toy Story book and she was pretty excited. After they completed the book exchange we gathered all of Tess’s stuff and took her home to try and clean her up because we had a surprise for her.

After the Daycare Party we cleaned Tess up and changed her and then told her that we were going to Zoo Lights. She was really excited to go to the zoo so we had to explain that it’s more Christmas lights with some animals. She was fine as long as she was able to see some animals. She had a good time with the Braun Family looking at Christmas Lights, seeing some animals, going on the carousel and playing at the zoo after dark. She had so much fun she passed out on the way home.

This was our first Christmas in the new house and since Clayton was working Christmas Day we decided to give Tess her Presents early. A funny story about her present is that I knew she wanted some ponies and I had looked all over for a pink unicorn that could fly and I thought I had found one and it was a little more expensive than the rest but I really didn’t care because I had found what she wanted. Little didn’t I know it was three times the size as the other ponies, she didn’t care. The big one is actually her favorite one.

Christmas Eve was spent at the Fedon residence where we ate a wonderful meal and played some old school Nintendo. We were amazed that it still worked so well and actually looked pretty good on the TV. I posted pictures on facebook and so many people commented about the fact that it was an old-school Nintendo and how awesome it was that we still had one. It was a nice low key Christmas Eve spent with good friends/neighbors.

Tess and I woke up early on Christmas Morning and made our way to my parents’ house to open presents with the Braun family. Tess received a dress up set from my mom so she dressed everyone up while my mom was putting the finishing touches on lunch. Tess even dressed Roscoe up. After lunch we headed up to the station to see Clayton for a little bit before heading home. Tess had a long day, she got up early and didn’t take a nap.

We headed to Dallas that Monday to celebrate Christmas with the Harris Family. When we got there she was so excited to see her Mickey Tree. It took her awhile to see all the presents under the tree. Granny came over for lunch and after we ate Tess opened up her presents. Once Tess opened her Presents we immediately took Christmas down and got into party mode. That Saturday we were helping Mona host an 80^th birthday party for Granny.

Tuesday evening I flew to Corpus to meet my mom so that I could attend a funeral of a very sweet woman who took me in during my college years. She was my roommate’s grandmother who passed away the day after Christmas. I flew back to Dallas on Wednesday evening. While I was in Corpus the Harris Family went to ICE and had a blast.

On Thursday we were back in full party prepping mode. We had a lot to do before Saturday and only had 2 days to accomplish it. The party was great and I think Granny had a great time. We saw a lot of people and I met a bunch of people. We were glad when Saturday night came so that we could relax a little.

We did have fun in Dallas and had to take our puppy picture before we left. Tess has many pictures with this same puppy throughout the years she has visited Dallas. We had to be out of the house early one morning so we went to eat pancakes at IHop and Tess had to sit next to Nana. This picture perfectly shows their relationship.

When we got home from Dallas we were exhausted and ready for a vacation from our vacation. Tess was ready to play. Tess busted out the Legos and wanted her daddy to help her make a Lego castle. I am not very good at building things for her so she always defaults to her daddy to build her things. I think this is a constant in his life. He builds me tables and her castles. Don’t think he will ever get away from building things.

One night I got out of the shower and could not find Tess and Clayton. They were in her bed watching a movie or one of her shows. He usually doesn’t put her to bed but since they were already in bed and ready I let him put her to bed that night.

We have really had a great year, I wouldn’t change a thing.

The eleventh month

November is always a pretty busy month for us, it seems like it started slow and then all of a sudden the month slipped away from us. So Tess has learned to embrace the hardware store, with us selling our old house and building a new house we have been to Lowes and Home Depot a lot this year. Tess was getting a ride one morning while we were shopping at Lowes. I can’t remember what this trip was for but it was one of our many trips. And now when we tell Tess that we are going to run errands she asks if we are going to the hardware store. She also has started to be able to pick out which tools are which. I think this make Clayton very happy, I think he has been secretly quizzing her on tools.

Later that day Tess changed into a skirt because it got a little warmer and she was riding around on her bike. She has finally gotten big enough to ride her bike, she is actually getting a little big for her trike and might need an actual bike.

For my birthday this year Tess gave me an extra special present. I received a phone call from Daycare and they said that she was playing outside and she went after the ball and ran into the gate. The gate split her head open and they aren’t sure if she needed stitches. I told them I would send her father over and he would take a look at it and make the call, he took her over to an urgent care center and they patched it up with steri strips and sent her on her way. She went back to daycare after eating some ice cream with her daddy.

Thanksgiving is always busy for us we spend Thanksgiving Day with my family and then Friday morning headed out to Lampasas. We knew that it was going to be cold but I don’t think any of use expected it to be as cold as it was. During the drive we hit the cold front and the temperature dropped 10-15 degrees almost instantly. After we got there we went to the store and got a heavier coat and hat for Tess, I think she liked her new outfit.

About the time we got there it was feeding time for the cows. Tess fed the cows the first and second day and loved it, she thought it was so cool to be so close to cows. She still remembers feeding the cows and wanted to go back to feed them again.

We got a hotel room this year and Tess was sleeping on a pull out couch. She was so tired to first night that everyone got back to the hotel and passed out. By the time I got out of the shower Tess had passed out and was utilizing the entire space available to her.

Since it was so cold and rainy outside we all were stuck inside playing games and playing with Tess. We had a lot of family time this year as we all were in the same place at the same time and usually we are all spread out doing different things and come together at night to spend time together.

 Tess had a lot of fun at the ranch and even though she didn’t get to run around the land she still ran around the house and spend a lot of time with Maggie and loved feeding the cows. I think she secretly likes ranch life. She passed out on the way home.

As always Tess loves to spend time with her puppies and most of the time Lexi is the one puppy that gets the most of Tess’s attention. There are days that Lexi seeks out Tess’s attention and then there are days like these pictures where it looks like Lexi just wants some alone time.

October 2015

October was a pretty good month for us. Tess loves to dress up and while I was out shopping one day I saw some wings that were on sale and I bought them for her. She saw them and was so excited and wanted to put them on immediately. She still asks to put them on randomly when she sees them in the closet and will walk around the house wearing her butterfly wings.

We went up to Dallas for a weekend and went to a pumpkin patch. Tess was running all over the place with Caroline and they finally slowed down enough for one picture together. After the pumpkin patch we went to pizza garden for lunch and then headed home to rest and relax.

This year was the first year that Tess actually went trick or treating. She was Rapunzel this year, she first started telling me that she wanted to be Rapunzel back in August and I kept asking her what she wanted to be and she kept saying she wanted to be Rapunzel. I was really surprised that she didn’t change her mind at any point in time. We walked around a couple of streets and a lot of people went all out for the holiday. Tess had a lot of fun and she did really well going up to people’s houses and saying Trick or Treat and then said Thank you. Then we came home and she helped pass out Candy. October is always the beginning of the holiday season. This was the last calm month for us.

Time for an update...

Late summer always seems to be a busy time for us. It starts with the Texas Fire Fighter Games and includes multiple Astros games, and afternoons outside. This year the Texas games were held in Conroe which was nice because usually when Clayton travels I don’t get to watch him play. There were a lot of new guys on his team and they played really well and were undefeated up until the last game. The games and heat took their toll on the guys and they fought a good fight but came in second. The other teams did well also, the second division team won gold and the third division team came in 4^th. All in all the guys played great and represented Houston well.

This year Clayton added a couple of softball tournaments to the mix. Softball isn’t usually his sport of choice but both tournaments were for charities for firefighters that had passed away in the southwest inn fire and Clayton knew both of them. I think he would like to get a team together and make it an annual thing but we will see. The park is a nice location, has a lot of shade so even though it was hot there was a nice breeze which made it bearable.

One of the times that we were hanging out at my parents’ house Tess decided that she wanted get in the ottoman and see if she could fit. She definitely fit, and she thought it was hilarious that we were taking pictures of her in there with her table and chairs.

Clayton and I actually had a rare night out this summer, Tess spent the night at my parents’ house and we went out with some friends. It was nice to get out and enjoy some time away from Tess every now and then.

We spent a lot of our September at Astros Games, and after a while every time Tess saw baseball on TV she would say look the Astros are on TV. We made a small mistake one time and walked by Mickey and Tess became infatuated with taking pictures next to Mickey. We found a different entry door real quick that didn’t pass right next to Mickey.

One weekend Nana and PawPaw Kevin came to the Astros game so Tess had both sets of Grandparents at the game. She stole my phone at one point of the game and started taking pictures of everyone. She is actually pretty good at taking pictures, when the person is paying attention.

One Sunday while vacuuming Tess went and got her Minnie Vacuum and helped me out. If only her vacuum actually worked then we would get the work done in half the time. She still gets excited and wants to help me dust and fold laundry. Hopefully this excitement is still around when she is a teenager.

Tess Loves bubbles and she loves going outside and blowing bubbles and she loves trying to catch bubbles when I blow them for her. Tess and I usually will go out there on afternoons or evenings that Clayton is working and spend some time outside. It gets Little outside and runs off some of her energy.

We went to an Astros game on a Rainy day and Clayton put Tess on his shoulders and Tess insisted on holding the umbrella. The pictures turned out really cute but I am pretty sure the only dry one was Tess. Clayton was probably soaked by the end of the walk.

One afternoon while Clayton was at work I raised the blinds on the door and was startled by this big bug that had perched itself on our door. I looked it up and I think it was a stink bug, I didn’t want to let the dogs out until I knew it wasn’t going to hurt them. It eventually left our door and found a new place to land.

That's our summer in a nutshell, next up the busy fall/holiday months. It seems like this year has slipped through our fingers. 

Hawaii

We went on our first big family vacation since Tess has been born. We went to Hawaii with the Braun Family. We had been pumping Tess for the plane ride and swimming with the fishes and being on the boat. We went to a movie the night before to hopefully keep her up late and help with the sleeping on the plane and the time change.

We got up early on Saturday and made our way to the airport to meet up with the rest of the family. I had packed a whole bag of activities for Tess for the Plane and we went through most of them. We watched movies at the beginning and then moved on to other activities. We had a very talkative flight attendant that kept interrupting the movies. Tess and most of the other passengers were getting frustrated. I think he finally took the hint and stopped talking. Tess took a pretty good nap on the plane and the 8 hour plane ride passed by pretty quickly. We arrived in the afternoon and tried to stay awake as long as we could. Tess passed out around dinner and actually slept till pretty late in the morning.

Maui

Our first stop was in Maui and the ship was docked overnight.  The kids did a snorkeling excursion while my parents took Tess on a shopping trip. Since we had family pictures the next day we made sure to put on a lot of sunscreen and rented wet suit tops. We sent a quick picture to our Mom so that she knew we were being careful.

The snorkeling excursion was awesome we saw a lot of fish and the first of many turtles. The water was a lot colder than what we are used to but once you swim around in it for a while you forget about the temperature and just soak in the views. Matt and Clayton saw a lot more Turtles than Diana and I did but I will say it was awesome seeing these creatures in their natural habitat. Some people would get pretty close and the tour guides would tell them to back up and let the turtles swim free.

From what we heard the shopping excursion wasn’t what my parents expected but I heard that Tess was a trooper. It was Hot and the shopping area did not have A/C which was a theme around Hawaii. I think that A/C is a luxury there, one that we take for granted here.

We met my parents back on the boat and had dinner on the ship. The ship had a daycare for Tess so after dinner she would go play with her friends while we would catch a show or one of the entertainers. Tess really enjoyed going to daycare and the entire staff knew her name before the end of the second day. She tends to have this effect on people.

On the second day we were in Maui we had to get up real early because we were doing family pictures. 

We haven’t had a family picture in a really long time and we have added family members since our last official Braun family picture. 

The pictures turned out better than we thought and Tess did perfectly.

Since the pictures were taken on a beach we decided to bring our suits with us and change after the picture and hangout on the beach. Looking back at the pictures from this vacation I realized that I spent more time enjoying the vacation than spending time trying to capture the moments. At the time this was perfect, now that I am trying to document the trip it’s a little hard without pictures. I loved every minute of the trip, I just wish that I had a couple more pictures to show all the fun times.

Hilo

The boat traveled over night to the big island and we arrived at Hilo. This was another beach day, but a different kind of beach day. We rented a car and traveled to a black sand beach, which is different than any beach we have ever been to. 

The sand is not sticky so you don’t leave with this beachy feeling. Tess tried to use her Beach toys and she was not able to build a castle because the sand would not stick together.

A Turtle also washed up on shore and Tess saw her first Sea Turtle. She was so excited and wanted to keep walking over to it and saying hello. The scenery was nice and the beach was actually not very crowded. We had a pretty easy day enjoying the weather which was pretty mild because it was overcast and enjoying a different kind of beach. Clayton, My mom, Dad, Tess and I headed back to the ship while Matt and Diana headed to Kona because they had scheduled a Manta Ray dive for that night. We would meet up with them the next day.

Matt did a Scuba Dive and Diana did a Snorkel at a well-known spot in Kona. They said it was a once in a life time experience and loved every minute of it. The rest of us ate on the ship, Tess went to daycare and we went to one of the early entertainment shows.

Kona

We celebrated my mom’s birthday with a family snorkel day. Our very special birthday present to my mom was that we got the bottom floor of the boat to sing to my mom and the bartender gave her a very strong drink for free. I will say that this excursion is still my favorite. I searched all the excursions to find one that Tess could enjoy and this one said it was family friendly and it did not disappoint. The boat had these boogie boards that had holes cut out and clear inserts so that little ones could float around and look down at the fish. Tess loved these boards and wanted to float around and look at fish all afternoon. We had to trick her to get her back on the boat so that she would eat lunch.

There was also a slide on the boat, she went down the slide once and it didn’t go very well. I think she might have been a little small and didn’t have the speed to shoot out at the end of the slide. After she went down the slide then everyone had to also go down the slide. After she ate lunch she wanted to go back out on her boogie board and swim with the fishes more. At some point during this vacation she became a part of the mob. And now when she talks about this vacation all she talks about is when she went swimming with the fishes.

After the excursion we walked around Kona for a little bit, there were a couple of shops right around the docking area. Tess bought a little seahorse magnet but other than that we didn’t find that much around these shops. We had hoped that there would be more but unfortunately there wasn’t much there.

We had to tender in so this port was the perfect location to take a picture of our cruise ship.

Kauai

This was our last Island, and probably the worst excursion. Clayton and Matt signed up for a Kayaking excursion and like most boys they did not take any pictures. They said it was a lot of work but I would guess probably fun at the same time. The rest of us went on a Director’s Cut excursion where you are supposed to see movie locations. The locations we saw were from movies made in the 50’s and some of the locations weren’t even there anymore. The tour guide kept talking about a hotel that wasn’t even standing anymore. I saw more Elvis movie clips on this tour than I have seen my whole life. I would not recommend this excursion to anyone. Tess got bored very early and there was no way to get back to the ship. She spent a lot of time on my phone to keep her entertained.

That night we headed to a Luau, which Tess loved. She didn’t like the waiting around of the food but she enjoyed watching the people dance around. It was a nice show and we had really good seats. We had noticed that some seats were empty and some people let us know that there were people that ate in the main house and paid a lot of extra money for a steak. They missed out on a good portion of what makes a Luau a Luau, the pig.

The second day in Kauai was a rest day for all of us, we spent the day shopping a little bit and spending the day on the boat. It was a nice last day of the cruise. This cruise was different than every other cruise I have been on because there are no sea days, so you are always on the go. By the end of the cruise we were exhausted and that last day it was nice to not have anything planed and to just relax and have fun.

There was an early departure time because as the ship leaves Kauai you pass the Napali Coast. My mom did a lot of research to make sure that we were on the correct side of the ship to see the coast. There is only one way to get to this coast by land and it isn’t a very easy hike. The Napali Coast is gorgeous and we all just sat outside my parent’s room and enjoyed the view and the company.

Tess was the center of attention for the most of the trip, and this picture perfectly portrays how she was for the most part. She did so well on this trip and I love this picture, she is so happy, she was in her element on this trip. She loves being outside and in the water and this trip combined both of those things.

Oahu

Our last day in Hawaii was July 4^th and it was the perfect day to spend at Pearl Harbor. We got off the boat onto a bus that took us around the island and our driver told us little tidbits here and there about the island. He talked pretty much the whole time but didn’t really say anything of much importance. We got off the bus and started our very long day. This day was the hardest for Tess. We took a tram over to the Battleship Missouri where we had a guided Tour. Tess was not excited about being on another boat, this is where she started letting us know that she was ready to go home. From what I was able to hear the tour was interesting. We were able to stand where the Japanese surrendered, ending WWII and the nice thing about it being a guided tour was you could ask questions. After the tour Clayton, Tess and I stayed over by the Missouri and ate some lunch while the others when back to the other side of the museum.

There was a couple of hours to kill before our tour of the Arizona so Clayton and I took turns rocking Tess, she took a pretty good nap that day, which was good because she needed it. While waiting to ride out to the USS Arizona everyone meandered throughout the Aviation Museum. It was nice and had some interesting information. Right about the time Tess woke up it was our turn to see the movie before our Tour. She did remarkably well while at the Memorial. I had visited the Memorial before so I took Tess around and we quietly looked for fish and watched the water and made our way around and then lined back up to catch the boat back. I will say that even though she was ready to go home she did great after her nap. When we got back we got onto the bus and headed to the airport.

On our way to the airport I was looking in the bag for something for Tess to eat and Clayton had tossed Tess her lovey and I didn’t see it. When we were gathering everything up to get off the bus I didn’t see the lovey. We got settled in our seats on the plane and Tess asked for her lovey and none of us could find it. Clayton then looked at me and asked if I had gotten it out of the bus and I said I never took it out while on the bus. We then realized that lovey was on permanent vacation in Hawaii. Tess looked at us and said I left lovey on the bus, she didn’t really get upset at first until she realized that meant she didn’t have lovey to sleep with. First thing we didn’t when she got back home and recovered was buy a new lovey. She still talks about how she left her lovey on the bus.

Hawaii was a terrific trip, and I can’t believe how wonderful Tess did. I don’t think I would try a trip this long without family but this means that we can take a family trip with little and not be a complete disaster.